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Buena Vista Social Club At Carnegie Hall

"I felt I had trained all my life for this experience. The best record I have ever been involved in."--Ry Cooder

In March 1996 the World Circuit label arranged a junket to Havana, Cuba. In just over two weeks three albums were recorded. All three were released to great critical and public acclaim. The first release was the Afro-Cuban All Stars' A Toda Cuba le Gusta, followed by Introducing...Rubén González. The third album, Buena Vista Social Club was released in June 1997 and has since become a classic, selling over six million copies worldwide.

Juan de Marcos González, the founder of the Afro-Cuban All Stars and Sierra Maestra, had a long cherished dream of recording the music of Cuba's golden era, the 1940s and 1950s, with the original musicians of that time. Marcos was particularly keen to record the old masters together with a selection of the leading musicians from the new generation--this became the Afro-Cuban All Stars. Nick Gold's (World Circuit head honcho) dream project was to record a collaboration between a number of African and Cuban guitarists. He invited Ry Cooder to participate, the two having worked together before on Ali Farka Toure's Grammy Award-winning Talking Timbuktu. Cooder replied within hours saying he would be there and the rest is history!

Buena Vista Social Club is both the name given to this astonishing pool of musicians and the album, recorded in just six days in Havana's 1950s vintage EGREM studios. It was clear from the atmosphere of the recording sessions that something very special was taking place. However, no one could have predicted that Buena Vista Social Club would become a worldwide phenomenon, outselling any other record in the same genre, elevating the artists to superstar status and popularizing Cuba's rich musical heritage, all of which has contributed to a massive boom in Cuba's tourist and recording industries.

"De Camino a la Vereda"

Beto Villares

Listeners outside of Brazil may not immediately recognize the name Beto Villares, but with his international debut album and production credits behind one of the biggest selling international records of 2007 (the Grammy nominated CéU album), change is gonna come! Over the past decade Beta's developed into an established musician, composer, multi-instrumentalist and music producer. Back in Brazil, Beto is in serious demand, producing award-winning movie soundtracks, television show theme songs, and multi-platinum selling recording artists.

CREDITS: Beto's soundtracks include City of Men (the television adaptation of the international film phenomenon City of God), Antonia and Filhos do Carnaval, The Year My Parents Went on Vacation and the Golden Globe nominated Behind the Sun. As a producer, he has worked with Pato Fu, Zélia Duncan (of Os Mutantes), and the previously mentioned CéU. Those artists returned the favor when Beto recorded his first solo album, Beto Villares.

Beto Villares
"Rio da Bossa Nova" (mp3)
from "Beto Villares"
(Six Degrees Travel Series)

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